Flight delays at Newark Liberty still among the nation's worst

Newark Liberty International Airport ranks among the lowest when it comes to airport delays.

(John O'Boyle/The Star-Ledger)

People waiting for a plane to arrive at Newark Liberty International Airport last year had a worse time of it than people waiting to take off, according to data from Bureau of Transportation Statistics. In fact, they waited longer at Newark Liberty than at any of the major airports in the country.

According to BTS, arrivals were on schedule 70.36 percent of the time last year at Newark, only slightly better than the 69.44 percent on-time figure from 2012.

LaGuardia Airport in New York (72.17 percent), San Francisco (72.66 percent), O’Hare in Chicago (73.52 percent) and John F. Kennedy in New York (75.43 percent) had better on-time performances, while Salt Lake City in Utah had the best on-time showings at 85.04 percent.

A flight is considered late when it is more than 15 minutes behind schedule. The national average is 78.34 percent.

Arrivals often are affected by factors outside of the airport’s controls, such as delays at the origination city or weather problems while in flight. The longest delayed flight to Newark was from Boston on Dec. 17. It arrived 4.5 hours after its scheduled time, according to BTS.

Arrival and departure times are more important for the travel industry than they are for the traveler.

“I’ve never heard a customer say ‘I’m not going there because of their on-time percentage record,’ ” said Chris Elliott, a syndicated travel columnist and author of “How to be a Smart Traveler.”

It's more about the destination than the means of getting there, he said.
Elliott said the data is "widely watched in the industry, and people will be rewarded or punished because of these numbers. Several airlines heavily incentivize their employes to improve these numbers."

Newark Liberty improved its departure time percentages slightly over last year and moved from the bottom of the list to 26th of the 29 top airports.

Departures left on time 72.65 percent of the time from Newark, up from 71.21 percent in 2012, when the airport ranked last. Denver’s airport (72.51 percent), along with Chicago’s two airports, O'Hare (70.37) and Midway (66.60 percent), rounded out the bottom of the list.

According to the BTS, weather was the cause of delayed flights about 57 percent of the time

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